Syllabus for POL S 203 A: Introduction To International Relations

Political Science 203                           Professor Jonathan Mercer ([email protected])

Winter 2016                                        Office hours, Gowen 135: W 3:30-5:00

M,W, F: 10:30-11:20                           

Room: Smith 120                                 

Teaching assistants:                                         Sections

Will Gochberg              [email protected]          AA, AG

David Lucas                 [email protected]            AC, AH

Stephen Winkler          [email protected]            AE, AF

Daniel Yoo                   [email protected]               AI, AJ

Wesley Zuidema          [email protected]        AB, AD

This course introduces students to the major theoretical approaches to international relations—Realism, Liberalism, and Marxism—and uses these approaches to address a variety of issues. For example, we will discuss the rise of the modern state system, the origins of World War I, the Cold War, the Gulf and Iraq Wars, genocide in Rwanda, free trade, globalization, North-South relations, the environment, and human rights. The primary aims of the course are to demonstrate how theory influences our explanations; to familiarize students with some important issues in international politics; and most important, to help students evaluate contemporary issues in international politics.

Hard copy of the syllabus here

Course readings here

Lecture outlines here

TA reading questions here

Past exams here

Place for discussion here 

Daily reading of the New York Times. Hardcopy and full access to nyt.com: visit/call HUB Games Area at 206.543.5975 or the By George Newsstand at 206.543.4087. Digital subscription, NYTimes.com/UWashington.

Grading

            Grades will be based on three in-class exams (25%, 25%, and 30%) and on participation and performance in section (20%). No make-up exams unless: 1) the student receives the instructor’s permission prior to the exam, or 2) the student provides a written excuse from a physician for having missed an exam. Attempts at a fait accompli (“but I already bought my ticket”) will fail without exception. For additional information on courses, grading, academic conduct, and on university policies, go here

Course Outline

Exam (25%) 

Exam (25%)

Final exam (30%)

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PART I: EXPLAINING INTERNATIONAL POLITICS

M 1/4 Introduction

David Ziegler, “War in the Past,” War, Peace and International Politics (Harper Collins, 1993), pp. 17-30.

Felix Gilbert and David Large, “The quest for hegemony and world power,” The End of the European Era: 1890 to the present (Norton, 1991), pp. 101-121.

Rudyard Kipling, "White Man's Burden," [1899] from Rudyard Kipling, The Works of Rudyard Kipling, vol. 21 (New York: Scribners, 1903), pp. 78-80.

M, W 1/11-13. Realism and International Politics

Thucydides, "The Melian Dialogue," A History of the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC), trans. Rex Warner. Penguin, 1954/1972, pp. 400-408.

Robert Gilpin, "The Theory of Hegemonic War," J. of Interdisciplinary History (Spring 1988): 591-613.

John Mearsheimer, “Why the Ukraine Crisis Is the West's Fault,” Foreign Affairs September/October 2014.

John Mearsheimer, “What should be the purpose of American Power?” The National Interest (September-October 2015).

F, W 1/15, 1/20 (holiday M 1/18) Liberalism and International Politics

Michael Doyle, "Kant, Liberal Legacies, and Foreign Affairs," Philosophy and Public Affairs (Summer 1983): 205-232 (skip part V, pp. 232-35).

Michael McFaul, “Confronting Putin’s Russia,” NYT (24 March 2014).

“Faulty Powers: Who Started the Ukraine Crisis?” Read McFaul (skip Sestanovich), and then Mearsheimer’s response, Foreign Affairs (November-December 2014): 167-178.

Ann-Marie Slaughter, “What should be the purpose of American power?” The National Interest (September-October 2015).

F, M 1/22-25. Marxism and International Politics

John Cassidy, “The Return of Karl Marx,” The New Yorker (20 October 1997): 248-259.

Zilliacus, “Economic and Social Causes of War,” Mirror of the Past: A History of Secret Diplomacy (NY: A.A. Wyn, 1946), pp. 136-149.

Ben Norton, “U.S. imperialism was the real winner of the presidential debate,” Salon (12 November 2015). Also found here.

Dennis the Peasant

W 1/27. Origins of WWI

Review Gilbert and Large, “The quest for hegemony.”

Michael Gordon, “Domestic Conflict and the Origins of the First World War: The British and the German Cases,” Journal of Modern History 46/2 (June 1974): 191-226.

F 1/29. Exam (Bring exam books)

M 2/1. End of the European Era: Versailles to Munich

Ziegler, “Results of WWI” and “WWII,” pp. 39-51.

Paul Kennedy, “A Time to Appease,” The National Interest (July/Aug 2010): 7-17.

W 2/3. Origins of the Cold War: the Bomb and Containment

Ziegler, “The Cold War and the Korean War,” pp. 53-73.

Stephen Walt, “ISIS as a Revolutionary State,” Foreign Affairs (Nov/Dec 2015):42-51.

F 2/5. Korean War and the Cold War

Dwight Garner, “Carpet-Bombing Falsehoods About a War That’s Little Understood,” NYT (July 21 2010).

Bruce Cumings, “A ‘Forgotten War’ That Remade the United States and the Cold War,” The Korean War (NY: Modern Library, 2010), pp. 206-221.

John Lewis Gaddis, “The Long Peace,” International Security 10/4 (1986): 99-142.

M 2/8. Explaining the Long Peace and the Soviet Collapse

Gaddis, “The Long Peace.”

PART III: A NEW WORLD ORDER?

Eric Miller and Steve Yetiv, “The New World Order in Theory and Practice: The [G.H.W.] Bush Administration's Worldview in Transition,” Presidential Studies Quarterly (March 2001): 56-68.

John Stoessinger, “From Sarajevo to Kosovo,” Why Nations Go To War (St. Martin’s, 2001), pp. 217-250.

M 2/15 Holiday

W 2/17 Rwanda

Video, “Triumph of Evil,” Frontline, watch it (in readings), or read the transcript.

Samantha Power, “Bystanders to genocide: Why the United States let the Rwandan tragedy happen,” The Atlantic (September 2001): 84-108.

F 2/19. Iraq War

Paul Kennedy, “The Perils of Empire,” Washington Post (April 20, 2003).

Max Boot, “Neither New nor Nefarious: The Liberal Empire Strikes Back,” Current History (Nov 2003): 361-366.

M 2/22. Exam (Bring exam books) 

PART IV: ECONOMIC AND TRANSNATIONAL ISSUES

W, F 2/24-26. Free Trade

Robert Gilpin, “The Nature of Political Economy,” excerpts from U.S. Power and the Multinational Corporation (1975).

John Cassidy, “Winners and Losers: The truth about free trade,” New Yorker (2 August 2004): 26-30.

M, W 2/29-3/2. Globalization & North-South Relations

Jagdish Bhagwati, “ Banned Aid: Why international assistance does not alleviate poverty,” Foreign Affairs (Jan-Feb 2010) .

Nicholas Kristof, “Where Sweatshops are a Dream,” The New York Times (14 January 2009). Also found here.

Ken Silverstein, “Shopping for Sweat: The human cost of a two-dollar T-shirt,” Harper’s Magazine (January 2010): 36-44.

Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, “The Women’s Crusade,” New York Times Magazine (August 23, 2009). And watch, “The Girl Effect”

F, M 3/4-3/7 North-South Relations and the Environment

Marvin S. Soroos, “The Tragedy of the Commons in Global Perspective,” in The Global Agenda: Issues and Perspectives fourth edition (McGraw-Hill, 1995), pp. 422-435.

Barry Schwartz, “Tyranny for the Commons Man,” The National Interest (July/August 2009): 64-73.

W 3/9. Identities: Conflict and Cooperation

Samuel P. Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations?” Foreign Affairs 72/3 (Summer 1993): 22-49. And read:

 Interview with Huntington, “A head-on collision of alien cultures?” NYT (10/20/2001).

F 3/11 Justice and Human Rights

Suzanne Katzenstein and Jack Snyder, “Expediency of the Angels,” The National Interest (March/April 2009): 58-65.

Monday 14 March 8:30am: Final exam in Smith 120. Bring exam books.

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